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Editorial Reviews

Product Description

Based on real-life events, 9th COMPANY recounts a year in the shared lives of a group of young soldiers drafted to serve in Afghanistan during the final year of the Soviet conflict. It is a poignant story of the unit s dedication to each other during their valiant defense of Height 3234...a futile battle that ravaged their forgotten company, who fought on, unaware that the war had ended.

Reminiscent of Apocalypse Now, Full Metal Jacket and The Big Red One, 9th COMPANY is credited as being the first real post-Soviet era war film.

The highest grossing film in Russia in 2005 at $27 million, 9th COMPANY also won a NIKA Award for Best Film and marks the feature directorial debut of Fyodor Bondarchuk, son of renowned director Sergei Bondarchuk War and Peace, 1968.

Bonus Features IncludeMaking of the Movie20 Years LaterPremiereTheatrical TrailerUK TrailerUS TrailerTV Commercials

Review

9th COMPANY, Russia s domestic top-grosser of 2005, has been touted as the first major film to attempt to do for their Afghan war what Platoon and other pics did for Vietnam. --Variety

Top customer reviews

Very visceral movie, graphically showing the futility of the Soviet War in Afghanistan, the graveyard of empires. I listened to the dialogue in Russian, but put on the English subtitles to stay with the pacing. Some of the words were misspelled, others incomplete and in a few cases, missing altogether. Bondarchuk directs a good movie and plays a good Warrant Officer (which is what propershchik means, not drill sergeant). If you have served in Afghanistan, you'll notice a few things that don't fly like the bunching up of troops on a patrol, and same for the mujahideen attacking in the final battle.

This Russian movie presents the story of a Platoon-sized group of young trainees that enter into Soviet Army service and undergo difficult and abusive basic training that ultimately develops unit cohesion among them. They are transferred during the late stages of the Soviet War in Afghanistan to serve in the 9th Company of the (345th PPD) of the Soviet Airborne Troops on a hill known as Hill 3234. The movie is a blend of Full Metal Jacket, Platoon, Stalingrad and Saving Private Ryan and has very realistic and graphic portrayal of war violence including blood-lust, but also of the subtle transformation that results in self-sacrificing heroes being made of regular young men. The visualized mountains and valleys effectively convey separation and isolation, if not even abandonment. One minor complaint is that the English subtitles seem to go by very fast, so you better be ready to read quickly.

I enjoyed it and have watched it 3 times since I bought it about a month ago. I learned a great deal from it regarding the Russian (maybe Soviet) point of view. The treatment of the recruits and soldiers is in line with what I have heard throughout my own military career. In a word, it's harsh and it is normal for NCOs and sometimes Officers to physically "correct" the lower ranks (conscripts) with beatings.

If you are a fan of Russian weaponry, this is your movie. It's filled with AK-47s, AK-74s, RPKs, PKMs, the list goes on. There is plenty of military action involving an attack by "The Muj" as they are called in the movie. There are other violent military encounters as well that are pretty well acted and realistically portrayed. Some scenes are quite realistic while others seem an attempt to make an excuse for the Soviet loss by showing the Mujahadin as "ghosts" who can disappear into the landscape while standig 20 yards from the Russians. Having been deployed to Afghanistan, I found the locations portrayed interesting also. The locations used in filming are convincing as Afghanistan.

You need to be warned about something here though...this is not a movie you can watch with a child!!!There is a scene with and much discussion about a character named "Snow White" who is an attractive 20-something young woman known by the soldiers for "servicing" recruits that come through this boot camp. They gather with her and take turns being "serviced". The actress is nude and even the parts of the scene that don't show her completely nude are too suggestive for young eyes. During the end of this scene, she is shown completely nude and the soldiers are bowing to her in their own sort of mock worship. Frankly, I found the bits involving her and discussion of her to be degrading and they made me uncomfortable. But, honestly, that emotion was an American one. It was interesting to me to wonder what the Russian mind would be thinking at that point in the movie.

All things considered, this is a movie well worth the money. I value it for entertainment and education. I recommend watching this movie in Russian with subtitles.

Not going to go in depth for a movie review here, just please watch it from beginning to end yourself. Take it with a grain of salt though, the voice-overs aren't the greatest for such a film. I would have preferred subtitles instead. You really don't get the full taste of the characters when all you hear is voice-overs. That being said the imagery of the movie is pretty good, as well as the scenery and combat/action footage. Almost all of which is real explosions that they used in the making of this film.

Now for the "realistic" portrayal of the "9th Company" which in fact was a real company that did fight in Afghanistan. It shows an accurate portrayal of Soviet military training during that time, most of this film is on spot in terms of historical accuracy, EXCEPT. The most glaring falsified part of this film is the final battle on the hill, which did take place in real life. But the extent to which this movie portrays it is vastly over-exaggerated. 9th Company did take some casualties, but it was never like how this movie makes it seem... Otherwise I would have given this movie a rating of 5 stars, but I'm pretty big on historical accuracy. Even with the crummy voice overs which I can deal with, but misrepresentation of historical facts is something I dislike. So all in all, 4 out of 5 from me.

I liked this movie and there are other reviews of the story so I will confine my comments to the English track on the bluray version:

I tried to listen to the English version on the bluray and gave up after about 10 minutes. The English voice actors sound like they are sitting in a pub, reading each line between swigs of beer without any emphasis or inflection that would indicate that they are even aware of the context of that line in the movie. Only slightly better than the dubbing for Bruce Lee's movies, where a single voice actor played all characters.

Fortunately, you can listen to the Russian track and turn on the subtitles.